Trolling Motor Battery Accessories

When you buy a boat, you immediately realize you can’t just stop at buying a boat. You also have to buy a million and one accessories that are necessities for any boat. Things like anchors, ropes, bumpers, rod holders, fish finders, and the list goes on and on and on. It seems like for every one accessory you buy for a boat, there are at least two more accessories to accessorize the original item.

Take the trolling motor battery for instance. First of all, your trolling motor battery is already an accessory to your trolling motor, but that’s besides the point.

Once you have picked the perfect battery, here are a few additional items you may need to consider purchasing:

Battery Chargers

Batteries today are designed to last longer than ever, but that doesn’t mean they won’t eventually run out of juice. By the very nature of their purpose, all trolling motor batteries are going to eventually need recharging, some more frequently than others. The variety of chargers available rivals the variety of marine batteries available. There are portable chargers, on-board chargers and more traditional chargers.

Many modern chargers will have some bells and whistles built-in like LED lights that display the progress of the charge. Many chargers also offer protection from over-charging your battery which can be a huge benefit so you don’t fry your battery and have to get another one.

For extra convenience, consider an on-board charger which mounts in your boat and charges your battery as you go. This way you don’t have to worry about running your charger and extension cord out to the boat, or worse, lugging your 60 pound battery back and forth between the charger and the boat.

There’s nothing fancy about a battery box. It is exactly what it sounds like. A rigid plastic box for you to put your battery in. But battery boxes do play an important function when it comes to caring for your battery. The battery box is designed to keep your battery protected from the elements. It not only keeps it dry but free from dirt. The box also keeps the terminals covered so there will be no accidents if you are fishing with youngsters. It also protects in the case of an acid spill. Most boxes include mounting hardware so that they can be directly mounted in the boat. Most of them come with a strap to keep the lid on and most of them have handles for easy carrying. You can also get a more advanced box that functions as a power center. On the other end of the spectrum, you can get a battery tray that holds your battery in place, but doesn’t have the walls or top like a true box.

Battery Hardware

There is a lot of different hardware available for trolling motor batteries. Depending on your intentions and your skills, you can use additional hardware to customize your battery set up. The long list of available battery hardware includes items like terminals, plugs, connectors, wires, etc. There are lots of guys that are tinkerers and they can use various pieces of hardware to come up with some really customized set ups. In my personal situation, I have mostly stuck with a very basic set up, opting only to install a quick disconnect plug which is really convenient so I don’t have to waste my time searching the bottom of the boat for the wingnuts that I inevitably drop every time I remove them from the battery.